The Manchester Skin Tech Expo was nearing - the 6th of March 2004 was planned away as the day I was going to go and have a laugh whilst watching hundreds of people tattoo and be tattooed. Never did I think I would actually come away with a tattoo of my very own.
At A Glance Author MJ Contact MJ@bme.anon IAM Fragile When A month ago Artist Jay Parker from Skin Illustrations in Kent Studio Skin Tech Expo 2004 Location Manchester Now children, we all know that tattoos are permanent, and thus probably should not be done on a whim. But when there´s so much art and skin staining under one roof it needs someone of more self-control than I to pass that opportunity up.
So we wandered - Emma, Karen, Steve, Rusty, Emily et al - and came across Jay Parker. Well this Jay Parker is a very kind man, and I told him of an idea I had played with. It was, however, an idea that most tattoo-artists I had come across would not put onto my skin. In short, I wanted "left" and "right" tattooed onto the soles of my feet.
This, he said, was easy. One need only to find a couple of willing volunteers to hold me down whilst he tattoed. These two individuals were right at hand - Emma and Steve - along with Paparazzo Rusty and some guy photographing for SkinTech. So the shoes came off, and the angst came on.
Jay prepared, I fretted. He changed needles, gloves, and pretty much everything else in sight. There was a chair for him to sit and work, and a chair for me to kneel. In short, I felt I was looking more like someone who was praying to the God of painful tattoos than someone who was about to undergo a pseudo-enjoyable experience.
He had drawn out the words - Times New Roman font, which we had quickly assembled from a BME coupon on Emma´s makeup dispenser - and put them onto a transfer to go on my foot, after briefly starling us all with the obligatory "which one´s left?". So when the placement of my soon-to-be pretties was done, he got on with it, put some vaseline onto the feet and started tattooing.
And my, can I tell you, it hurt like hell. He tattooed and I looked like a rabbit in front of the headlights, sweating profusely and swearing under my breath. It was like someone had stuck a crochet-needle into my skin and was pulling it around in my foot. Argh. After "left" I had to have a minute´s respite to recover and ask myself why in the hell I was doing this. Whilst this was going on in my head, several people were force-feeding me easter eggs and glasses of water because apparently I was "looking peaky".
And so, accompanied by numerous "oooh" and "aaaah" of the general populous watching, he carried on with "right". This one hurt even more.
It was all over relatively quickly, although it seemed like an eternity. He rubbed off the excess ink and put some more vaseline on the fresh tattoos. I got a glimpse - they were so beautiful! Then he wrapped them up with some kitchen tissue and taped my feet up. The challenge now was to put my shoes back on...
I was told I wouldn´t be able to walk for at least 4 days. Not true. I walked, or should I say hobbled, home, passing people at the entrance, some of which asked what I had done and when I explained replied "so now you´ll know which foot to put your shoes on?", some of which probably thought I just had really bad haemmorrhoids.
I had to leave the initial bandage on for a couple of hours. When I got home I washed it with antiseptic soap and replaced it with copious amounts of vaseline cream and cling film; the next few days with savlon cream or nappy rash cream (this stuff is excellent - it´s called Sudocrem and it´s the best stuff ever) and cling film. This carried on for about 2 weeks. I kept it covered to preserve as much of the ink as I could and stop it rubbing off. It was hassle.
Now, after just over a month, the scabs have finally all come off. I was told initially that they may not last. They have faded a lot but are still easily recognisable. I love them. I have booked myself in to get them re-inked next week, this time dot-by-dot: this is supposed to cause less scarring and scabbing. The tattoo studio is also near so they will redo it for free if it wears off again. I am excited. I realise how much it´s gonna hurt this time, but I am positively excited.
I wouldn´t recommend this tattoo to anyone. Not on the soles of your feet, anyway. Not just because of the pain, but also because of the huge amounts of aftercare (huge amounts of cling film and Sudocrem you´ll go through, in addition to parcel tape and antiseptic wash), and the time it takes to heal properly, the slightly unsightly limp that you have to develop in order not to walk on those parts of your feet and the fact that you´d have to get them re-inked as little as a month afterwards.
As it happens, I love mine. I love the font, I love the novelty value, I love the fact that they are on the bottoms of my feet, I love the fact that you can see them when I walk wearing flip-flops. I am glad I did it, if not forever then certainly for the moment.